General Relationship DiscussionAlthough anyone can post anywhere on Talk About Marriage, this section is for people interested in general relationship and marriage advice.
We were watching "The Big Bank Thoery" last night and there is a scene where the guys are being nerdy in the comic book store. My wife says to me "thats what I would imagine Brian does" referring to the guy she was IM with late at night. I said "yeah, he reminds me of Wolowitz just not as cool". She laughed at her friends expense which surprised me and clearly shows how we rank.
One more time I'll explain this. Her mentioning him at all is bad news.
Women in affairs will bad mouth the men they are in EA/PAs with. I'm not saying that is or is not going on, but it's not a "good" sign. This happened in my story and countless other's I've read. "he's so ugly" "I would never do anything with him he's gross" "he's a c*cky a$$hole!" "I hate him!" and yet.................
One more time I'll explain this. Her mentioning him at all is bad news.
Women in affairs will bad mouth the men they are in EA/PAs with. I'm not saying that is or is not going on, but it's not a "good" sign. This happened in my story and countless other's I've read. "he's so ugly" "I would never do anything with him he's gross" "he's a c*cky a$$hole!" "I hate him!" and yet.................
Hate to say it but it is part of the script. I would at least GPS her phone/car then see if she is being honest about where she is going. I would put a var in the car too.
One more time I'll explain this. Her mentioning him at all is bad news.
Women in affairs will bad mouth the men they are in EA/PAs with. I'm not saying that is or is not going on, but it's not a "good" sign. This happened in my story and countless other's I've read. "he's so ugly" "I would never do anything with him he's gross" "he's a c*cky a$$hole!" "I hate him!" and yet.................
So mentioning him in a good way is bad, mentioning him in a bad way is bad. I'm sorry guys but I have to check out of this conversation. I have thoroughly investigated my wife on every level and she is not guilty of anything inapropriate. I have bugged her computer, checked phone and text records as well as e-mail and there is nothing. For you guys to keep pushing the EA and PA angle is to keep my paranoia level at defcon 5 which is actually hurting my chances of fixing things.
I am a paranoid pathetic mess because if she burps wrong, she is chreating on me. The more I act on the suspicions you are pushing, the worse I look.
I'm out. If I am wrong I will admit it but instead of spending my time convincing you she is not cheating, I will spend it fixing my marriage. Peace.
We are not tellingyou she IS cheating. The thing is we've seen this before again and agian. What we are telling you is to completely eliminate the possibility.
One poster who was reconciling found no evidence but his gut. He found his wife in the basement with the neighbor whike he was asleep on ambien. Others use secret phones or just meeet up when hubby is away.
I don't think an affair is your problem either but GPS and a VAR are cheap ways to prove it.
Paul, it would be bad for you to bail this thread.
Again, there is no reason to say "this is an affair"... The point others are trying to make is that your wife saying something about "how" another man is or behaves means her mind and thoughts are with that man. This is not a marriage-healthy place for her mind to be (thinking about how another man is). No reason to do any more digging. Her mind and heart are moving away from you.
If I remember correctly, your wife's soccer team suffered defections because one of its players, a married woman, was shamefully vaunting her affair with another man. Your wife became this woman's sole friend and then changed her views on cheating 180 degrees.
I agree that VARs and GPS would help to either confirm or deny any affair.
A slight game plan question I have had for awhile, but did not want to butt in:
The point of the spyware and everything else was ?
It seems to just SPY? Get an inside look at what she is doing and saying to people, as she isn't sharing with you?
If that's all it was, that's your call. But if there is no evidence of her cheating, how long do you intend to keep it up? Until you find something?
Isn't there a point where you back off and stop invading, and leave it alone? It seems a bit, umm, unmoral(?) at some point.
Secrets should not be allowed. Privacy should. Having a peek may be warranted. AFter that, what do you do?
I spied because there was no logical explanation I could find for her behavior. I spied for 2 reasons, vet out an affair, or get insight to her thinking with the assumption she is not telling me what is truly going on.
My wife is not that sophisticated to go that underground. I have a screenshot program that lets me see exactly what she is doing and eliminates the threat of her deleting messages. She has no money. there is no secret cell phone, the mileage on the car is exactly as it should be for what she does and her time is all accounted for. If she was having an affair it would be extremely inconvenient.
It would have to look something like this: since she takes care of my 3 year old it would have to be during the time they are together. The OM would have to sneak in the back porch into our bedroom while my wife locks our little girl out. They would have to fVck fairly quickly since my girl routinely walks into the room and would be upset to find a locked door. The OM would then have to exit the back unseen by my 3 year old since she would surely mention "mommies friend" id she saw someone. If she took my 3 YO to OM's house then my girl would also surely speak of "mommies friend".
These nefariious activities would have to be arranged without a cell phone, home phone or computer. Basically a carrier pigeon at best.
The sad thing is that I have gotten so paranoid from this place that I rejected the logic behind my thinking and came home at the only time an affair would even be possiblt unannouned only to find her running on the treadmill, just as she says she is. I end up looking like needy a$$hole because I have to make a lame excuse for being there.
How about after her soccer game? Well, I have seen her teams and since this is rec. soccer the men are in far worse shape then me and out sex rank all of them. I am a fit, good looking hard working business man with a salary large enough to support my wife not working and to support her toys and hobbies. But even if that wasn't enough, the latest she has ever been after a soccer game is 1 hour so an affair would have to be slammed in there when they are both sweaty and smelly.
I have been to her games. It takes 1/2 hour just to re-hydrate afterwards and remove all of the pads.
How about an EA? Well once again it would have to be done without a cell phone, home phone or computer. If they are that good, they can have each other.
My wife and I have problems, no doubt. I can't tell if she is fantasizing about other men nor can I control it. But for me to be re-directed constantly to this angle is now foolish.
I'm just venting and I do appreciate what you all have said. I realize you guys know your stuff and far be it from me to think I know any better. I don't know what the problem in my marriage is, I just know what it is not.
I was hoping you could respect that I know at least that much.
Just curious.. is this dude an engineer, or a computer geek?
Maybe she found the spyware.
She hasn't found jack. This guy is an unemployed geek living with mommy who's whole life revolves aroung FB and soccer.
I'm embarrassed that I even considered she could possibly have an EA with him. She is also embarrased that I could even think that and ofcourse once again, I look like a pathetic ba$tard for even suggesting it.
All it ended up doing was insult my wife and drop me down a number on my sex rank which still places me at least 3 above his.
Just reading about your experience looking into the thyroid to rule it out before working on other problems. I wanted to share part of my own story as encouragement or supportiveness to you. I allowed myself to blame most of my estranged husband's bad behavior on his thyroid -- that includes his cheating, verbal and emotional abuse, and his using me for everything while treating me like a doormat; while I can see that his out of whack thyroid contributed to his inability to control his impulses and and anger in moments where things flared up and can forgive that because of the illness, his choice to check out of the marriage to cheat out of boredom (EAs first, then PAs for casual sex), his choice to emotionally disengage from me as a way to justify his cheating and to chase thrills outside the marriage while treating me badly and making me bend over backwards not to make waves so I wouldn't pick up on his misdeeds was not caused by the thyroid but by his own selfishness. Something is going on with your wife, but please don't blame it all on out of whack hormones. She may not be cheating, but something is going on with her emotionally and you should get her into counseling to see if you guys can work it out. If not, this is NOT going to get any better any time soon.
I wish you luck. 6 months of separation and I see no improvement in my situation, just a downward spiral that's taken pain and begun turning it into anger and impatience from me.
Lots of good advice throughout your thread. Don't be Mr Nice Guy Doormat. Kick her off the pedestal. Stand up for yourself and take charge (but do it compassionately).
Edit: caught up on more of your thread. My STBXH/WH/EH chose to cheat on me with gutter trash even though I paid all the bills, supported all his hobbies and dreams, worked and cooked, and did everything for him while he sat around the house jerking off to porn and mistresses and hid it very very well -- and he didn't even have the decency to trade upwards! That insulted me worst of all; I could handle him cheating with someone better, but with anonymous online skanks? And they were doing it in code so it looked like their FB banter was innocent when it all meant other things (found some deleted emails about the code). That was a low blow. With this in mind, I think whatever is going on with her has less to do with you and more to do with herself; she's got some problems, clearly. If she's having an EA, it probably means she wasn't cheating to leave you but cheating to cake-eat conveniently. If it's not an EA, then something is causing her to behave in this weird way and you have got to try to find out what it is instead of rug-sweeping it or it will resurface again. And, don't think that it's all your fault or blame yourself for the problems.
I'm sorry for what you're going through whether an unlikely affair is at the bottom of it or something else entirely, it still sucks. Good Luck. Hang in there.
If I remember correctly, your wife's soccer team suffered defections because one of its players, a married woman, was shamefully vaunting her affair with another man. Your wife became this woman's sole friend and then changed her views on cheating 180 degrees.
I agree that VARs and GPS would help to either confirm or deny any affair.
Heres what happenned. A friend of hers from high school joined the team. The friend and my wife became close again after years of not seeing each other. The friend has two other close friends (husband and wife) who joined the team. Everything was rosy and they all developed into a championship (at the rec level) caliber team. My wife was etremely proud since she is the one who put the team together.
This friend of her is married to a guy 15 years older then her and is from a nationality where it is common to believe that a wife is a servant to her husband and treated her accordingly. The woman, despite her moral convictions started an affair with another team member. When the affair was discovered, the husband and wife friend of hers turned on her as their religious beliefs forbid this sort of thing. They gave an ultimatum that either the friend and her paramour go, or they go. The team went into chaos and my wife got depressed.
At this exact time my wife turned on me and my whole saga began. She embraced her cheating friend because she felt bad that she was so rejected. I believe my wife drew parrallels (I am 10 years older than my wife) between this womans problems in her marriage and our own. I believe my wife feels controlled because she relies on me 100% for support so she feels she has to run everything by me before acting. Mind you this is the dynamic that SHE created. SHE wanted to stay at home. SHE wanted to give up her job. I only supported her wishes and worked my a$$ of to make it happen.
Because she embraced this friend and because I could not see the logic in her displeasure I exhausted the cheating angle.
The team went into chaos and my wife got depressed.
At this exact time my wife turned on me and my whole saga began.
Do you think that maybe your wife is just depressed and confused? Maybe she is re-evaluating her choices in life and doesn't really know what she wants and is just trying to figure things out. It sounds like she took this situation pretty hard. If she sees you as controlling, it might be hard to get her to open up to you about her thoughts and why she has checked out of the marriage because it might be something she is using to feel a sense of power or self-control. Maybe the way you can get her to open up to you is by showing her that you're NOT controlling her, maybe encouraging her to do things that allow her to feel more strong and confident and then maybe she would be more willing to give you some of herself because she would not see it as a threat to herself or something that she gave out of obligation...just a thought.
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Re: When the Pain Turns to Anger 
